


A 21st Century Love Story

by jewelianna88



Category: Popslash
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-23
Updated: 2011-04-23
Packaged: 2017-10-18 13:37:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/189427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jewelianna88/pseuds/jewelianna88
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lance takes what he wants.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A 21st Century Love Story

6.

Lance had a plan. Six months of doing what he wanted, and then back to the real world. It was extremely self-indulgent, but after six painstaking hours at a hospital in Mississippi last year, he knew the value of getting the most out of life. Luckily, his dad was OK, but Lance wasn’t going to wait until a heart attack had him flat on his back before he realized that he needed to work less and stop putting off the fun stuff.

That’s what brought him to New York in early December. He’d always loved Rockefeller Center at Christmastime, with the lights and the giant tree. Lance was almost tempted to try ice skating as he stood by the railing and watched on a cold afternoon, but he’d never been quite good at it and the desire to get the full experience of Christmas was outweighed by the desire to not fall on his ass.

After soaking up the atmosphere until he felt bursting with Christmas spirit, Lance ducked into Dean and Delucca across the street to grab a mid-afternoon refresher before wandering down to Fifth Avenue to pick up some Christmas presents. The gingerbread mocha tickled his tongue, too hot and burning but delicious. He paused to stir in some cream and saw a familiar figure coming in the door.

“Justin,” he called, and for a minute, Justin’s face contorted. Lance knew the look: Justin’s “shit, I’ve been spotted by a fan” face. But when he realized who was calling, Justin smiled.

“Hey, man, what’s going on?” He sauntered across the coffee shop and held out his hand. Lance took it and pulled him into a hug. Justin looked good in his black leather jacket and knitted hat, gloves sticking out of his pockets. When he stepped back, he rubbed his hands together and reached for his wallet. “I didn’t know you were in town, man, what’s going on?”

“Just here for Christmas, you know. See the tree.” When he said it, it sounded lame, but Justin nodded so Lance wasn’t too embarrassed. “But you, what are you doing?” Last he’d heard, Justin was relaxing after tour. He hadn’t seen him since his LA show three months earlier.

“SNL, man, we’re in rehearsals today.” Justin stepped up to the counter and ordered a huge cup of coffee. “The stuff they have over there is shit and I didn’t feel like sending someone out. Just needed sunlight for a minute, you know?”

“Sure.” Lance sipped his mocha and didn’t think about how many calories it had. “So, you’re here all weekend then? We should do lunch or dinner when you get a minute.”

“Yeah, definitely. Or,” Justin paused to pick up his drink and take an experimental sip. “Are you doing anything this afternoon? Do you want to come check out what’s going down?”

Lance bit his lip and thought about it. He really didn’t feel like shopping, not in the throngs of New York crowds.

“Come on,” Justin urged. “Seriously, you love to see me look like an ass.”

That was true enough, so Lance agreed and walked back to the studio with Justin, finishing his coffee and dropping it in a trash can along the way. Justin drank his in tiny sips until it went cold, then sat it on a table in the studio and forgot about it.

Justin did look like a fool, which Lance enjoyed, though it got a bit boring after a while. He remembered when they were on the show together and their ugly striped shirts. It was much better being on this side of the camera, he thought. He’d realized that sometime after the second movie he’d made, the one that did OK despite his appearance. The third time, he stuck to being a creative consultant and producer, and that movie had actually done well. He and Joey had talked about setting up some kind of short-form producer/director unit after that, but baby number two had distracted Joey and Lance’s dad got sick, so the idea had been tabled.

When Justin was done for the day, he had to de-green himself from stage makeup. Lance watched him wash up in his dressing room, splashing water everywhere. Before he left, he mopped it all up, and Lance rolled his eyes because that was just like Justin.

“I know I’m totally crashing on your day, but do you have dinner plans? You probably do, right?” Justin changed into a dry shirt, flashing a bit of tight stomach at Lance. Lance appreciated that.

“No, actually. I’m here alone, I mean, I’m not meeting anyone. So sure, but low-key, right? I’m not really dressed for five star.” Lance stared down at his jeans and sneakers.

Justin laughed. “Well, that doesn’t really matter, but OK. There’s this place that does seafood that Joey told me about.”

“The place with the fried stuff?” Lance asked, because Joey had taken him there before and it was amazing. “Yeah, let’s go there.” He thought about his plans for the week, which had not included Justin at all, but he was doing what he wanted, and this was what he wanted.

Dinner was nice, and Lance ate fish and chips and again didn’t think about calories or running the next day for hours. Justin had something exotic sounding and broiled and said it wasn’t as good as in Hawaii but the best he’d had on the mainland, ever. They talked about family and gossip and how excited they were about The Hobbit, which was finishing production soon in New Zealand. Lance told him about the doing-what-you-want thing and Justin had grinned.

“That sounds so fucking awesome, man. Do you know how, fuck, how much I’d love to do something like that?”

Lance smiled, because it wasn’t often that he got to do something that Justin didn’t. He knew it shouldn’t make him happy because he wasn’t a 17-year-old being outshined by a 15-year-old anymore, but some things you just couldn’t outgrow.

After dinner, Lance debated going back to his hotel or saying something more to Justin, because they hadn’t really done anything like that in years, but heck, why not.

“Where are you staying?” Lance asked, because it sounded better than “Do you want to come up?”

“The Plaza,” Justin smiled. “Let me guess. You too?”

Lance grinned. It had been part of the whole Christmas nostalgia thing, and Justin knew him better than he’d thought.

“Yup. Coincidence,” Lance said as they walked to the car.

“Or fate,” Justin added. He looked at Lance, and Lance looked back at him, and they were both smiling. “Did I mention I’m here alone?”

“Yeah? Where’s Kirsten?” Lance asked, because the last he’d heard, Justin’s latest blonde girlfriend was following him around on tour.

Justin shrugged. “Dunno. I mean, I haven’t seen her in a couple of months. That whole thing was blown out of proportion, you know? I mean, last time I saw you, maybe, but I told you the whole thing with Jake and the party.” Lance nodded, because they’d talked on the phone at Thanksgiving and he’d heard that story, he’d just forgotten.

So, Justin was alone, and Lance touched his leg in the back of the car and smiled when Justin shifted a little bit closer. “Five minutes,” Justin promised, and didn’t even wait for the door to be opened for him when the car pulled up under the grand entrance.

Lance rocked on his heels in the elevator up to his room, because it was two floors lower than Justin’s and that much closer. At the ding of the bell, he smiled, and when they were safely in his room, he stepped out of his shoes at the door and shrugged out of his jacket before taking Justin’s face in his hands and kissing him properly.

It had been a while since they’d done this, but not so long that Lance didn’t remember the feel of Justin’s five-o’clock shadow under his palms or the taste of Justin’s preferred spearmint gum. Justin’s lips were wet and his tongue just never stopped moving, jumping in full steam ahead as Lance rubbed his fingers on the short sideburns by Justin’s ears.

Clothes came off easily enough, and Justin was in damn fine shape. Lance hummed appreciatively, and Justin smiled back at him, standing naked in all his glory.

“Dude, you too.” Justin laughed. “Clothes off, this isn’t a show.”

“It could be,” Lance teased as he sat on the bed and took off his socks. “You could dance for me.”

“Some other time,” Justin said, flopping down onto the bed next to Lance and rolling until they were tangled together. Lance laughed, filing away the idea, because Justin would be here through Sunday because of SNL and Lance had already planned to extend his stay.

They didn’t put much effort into sex, never had, but Lance didn’t mind because he was an advocate of penetration, but he loved this stuff too, Justin’s hand on his dick while he mouthed at Lance’s shoulders. Lance tried the same thing, but Justin gently pushed him away. “Shirtless shots this week,” he said, voice all breathy and sexy, so Lance bent his head further and sucked on Justin’s cock instead. He doubted the NBC execs would notice any hickies down there.

Justin was always loud during sex, moaning and grunting with every jerk of Lance’s hand as Lance licked at his balls, neck cricked painfully, but he didn’t care. He loved having Justin panting and begging beneath him. It was even better when Justin’s thighs tightened and he came in spurts all over Lance’s hand. Lance kept going until Justin had nothing more to give, raising up his head to watch as Justin’s eyes fluttered opened dreamily.

“Fuck,” Justin breathed. “No one is as good at that as you. Fuck.” He dropped his head back against the pillows, but his hands reached for Lance. “C’mere, man.”

“You’re not gonna fall asleep on me again?” Lance teased, but scooted up on the bed so that Justin could reach.

“That was one time!” Justin protested. “And I remember telling you not to let me drink whiskey that night.”

“Fine, fine, my fault,” Lance said, “but please?”

Justin laughed and used his hands because “I have to sing,” but Lance didn’t mind because that meant he could kiss Justin, and that was really good. He came quickly, too quickly for what he would have liked, but he never had much resistance when it came to Justin.

After, Justin kept kissing him for a while, until they were slumped back on the mattress, barely moving. “We should shower,” Lance said, because he knew that Justin hated to go to bed dirty.

“Mmmm.” Justin moaned. “Carry me?”

Lance snorted. “Not on your life.”

“Please?” Justin opened his eyes, puppy eyes. “Pretty please?”

Lance mentally kicked himself and sat up, leaning forward so Justin could wrap his arms around Lance’s shoulders and cling. “Fuck, I’m too old for this,” Lance moaned as he half carried, half dragged Justin into the bathroom and dropped him into the shower. He flipped on the water and laughed as a blast of cold made Justin shriek and jump to the far end of the glass enclosure. Justin flipped him off, and Lance laughed.

”Do you wanna stay here tonight?” he asked. “You can, if you want.”

Justin reached for the washcloth and soaped it up, the scrubbed it over his stomach. “Yeah. That’s cool, man, thanks.”

Lance took the cloth from him and smiled when Justin gave him a kiss. “No problem,” he said, because it wasn’t at all.

So far, he thought, this taking what he wanted thing was working out pretty nicely.

**

It snowed a little bit, the next day, but Lance went shopping anyway because Justin was doing more rehearsals and Lance was already bored with sitting in a chair in a studio all day. They met again for dinner, and Justin was buzzing about his post-tour plans.

“I’m going to my mom’s for Christmas, well, her place and my dad’s, and then Chris’s New Year’s thing in Vegas. You’re going to that, right?”

Lance nodded, because he hadn’t seen Chris since his birthday in October. They were just never in the same place at the same time.

“Right, so then, I’m not sure. I think I’m going to go right back into the studio, you know? I’ve got ideas and even if the album doesn’t come out right away, I want to get the recording done, because three years ago, I couldn’t write anything, so now I want to get it all out fast, you know?” Three years ago was the long lapse between his first and second albums, the period Lance thought of as Justin’s foray into acting. It probably would have led to a rather successful career if Justin’s writer’s block hadn’t vanished. Lance and everyone else on earth had realized that Justin’s inspiration seemed to come from break-ups, but no one had said anything to Justin because he was always a little surly after getting cheated on and dumped in a very public way.

“So, yeah, probably LA, but I’m also thinking I might try Nashville. Not country, but they’ve got some great studios there and it’s closer to home.” Lance smiled. Justin was a big mama’s boy, and it was really cute.

They had sex again that night, properly, in a big leather chair in Justin’s suite. Lance sat back with legs splayed, his skin hot and sweaty and sticking to the oversized recliner. Justin had his legs up around Lance’s arms, pinning them down, leg hair itchy on Lance’s biceps. It was the weirdest fucking position ever but Justin swore it felt really good at that angle so Lance complied. Justin didn’t generally offer to be on the receiving end, making it that much more special. Justin squirmed down on Lance’s lap and braced his arms on the ottoman behind him, and came when Lance touched his dick, squirting Lance in the face. It wasn’t very romantic, but Justin giggled and Lance pulled at Justin’s hips until he came deep inside of Justin.

Justin dropped his legs over the arms of the chair and sat up straight, wiping a smudge of semen off of Lance’s cheek.

“You fucker,” Lance said, because he knew that was one of Justin’s kinks and it didn’t do it for him at all.

“Sorry.” Justin smirked down at him and wiggled a little bit. Lance’s dick itched in the loose condom. “You get so red when you have sex, you know that? Like, your face is a tomato.”

“I do not,” Lance said, annoyed. He shoved at Justin until he got up and let Lance get rid of the condom and wipe off his chest. Justin followed Lance into the bathroom, still naked.

“You so do. See?” Justin pointed in the mirror at Lance’s flushed cheeks. “Like that, only all over, down to you chest even.”

“Whatever.” Lance flushed the condom away and flipped the dripping facecloth over a towel rack. What a way to spoil good sex.

Justin sensed Lance’s foul mood and paused, one hand resting on Lance’s forearm. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

Lance sighed. “Nothing. Just being weird.” He didn’t feel like having the ‘please don’t come in my face’ discussion with Justin just then. He wasn’t awake enough for it.

Justin licked his lips and started to say something but stopped. Instead, he tentatively hugged Lance and said “Do you want to stay?”

Lance did.

**

Two weeks later, Lance’s mom called and asked what was going on.

“What do you mean?” Lance asked, staring at the lights on the Christmas tree. Only one more week until the holiday, and he couldn’t wait. He sat down on the big tan sectional and let the overstuffed cushions pillow his head.

His mom let out a little sigh of annoyance. “I mean I have to hear it from Lynn that you’re staying at Justin’s house?”

Oh. That. “I told you we ran into each other in New York,” Lance said as casually as he could manage, sitting on Justin’s big comfortable sofa.

“Yes, you did, but you did not mention that you were following him home to Tennessee.”

Lance rubbed his temples. “We’re just hanging out, you know? We’re friends.”

“I’m aware of your friendship, James, but I can’t remember the last time you stayed at any one of your friends’ houses for two weeks.” Lance could hear the pots and pans rattling and knew his mom was making dinner. His stomach growled at the thought of food and he got up in search of a snack. Justin’s kitchen was bright and sunny in the late afternoon, with gleaming white paint on the walls and shiny specks of mica in the dark countertops.

“Look, there are no good hotels in Memphis except that one that let the guy from the Enquirer in, and I’m not staying there, so. Don’t worry about it; it’s just until the holidays.”

His mom hemmed and hawed some more, but finally let him go with a promise to bring back some barbecue sauce from a restaurant near Justin’s mom’s that Diane loved. Lance swore up and down that he would not forget.

Justin got home a few hours later. He’d been at his little brother’s Christmas concert and gone for ice cream afterwards. Lance was up watching Law and Order.

“Dude, is that show still on? I never get to watch TV any more.” Justin crawled up onto the couch next to Lance and curled into him, head on Lance’s shoulder.

“I don’t think it’s ever going to go off of the air,” Lance said. He petted Justin’s shoulder, his fuzzy sweater.

“Catch me up,” Justin said, stealing a sip of Lance’s beer before pulling an afghan down over his feet.

Lance looked down at Justin, whose eyes were intently focused on a Mr. Clean commercial, and smiled. He gave Justin a quick recap and they watched the rest of the episode together before bed.

**

Lance went home for Christmas and found he missed Justin, which was strange. He called to tell Justin, thinking they’d have a good laugh about it, but to his surprise, Justin said the same thing.

“It’s like, this is the first time in a while that we’ve hung out and it hasn’t been all ‘Remember this’ or ‘Remember that’. We’ve got like, stuff to talk about that’s us now, and that’s kinda nice.”

Lance thought about it for a minute and realized that was true. “So what are you doing after New Year’s?” he asked.

“More recording,” Justin replied. “I’m definitely doing the Nashville thing, I’ve got a house down there and stuff now. Why, what about you?”

Lance didn’t really have any concrete plans, so when Justin suggested that he come to Nashville too, Lance agreed. He really wanted to.

They met up in Vegas at the Palms, because Lance had long ago invested in the casino and could therefore get Chris a good deal on the party. Chris was three sheets to the wind by the time Lance got there, and it didn’t take him long to catch up. There was just something about the bluish lights that made him want vodka and Curacao, and Lance was taking what he wanted.

JC showed up next to him at one point, his latest actress on one arm. “Dude, I hear you’re staying with J,” he said, leaning in so he could yell over the music.

Lance smiled. “I think he feels like he needs to take care of me, cause I’m in between projects,” he said.

JC frowned. “Dude, that’s not what he said.”

Lance looked at JC strangely, wondering what that meant, but the midnight countdown started before he got a chance to ask. Lance looked around for Justin but couldn’t find him in the crowd. Instead, he kissed one of Chris’s friends at midnight, then JC, just for fun. JC’s girlfriend looked someplace between shocked, amused, and horrified, which only made Lance do it again and try to slip him the tongue. JC laughed and wiped his mouth.

“Go find Justin,” he ordered, pushing Lance away. Lance went, gladly. He found Justin by the bar and they made out for a while in the back room, until Chris found them and made them come out and say goodbye to Joey and Kelly.

“He’s like my mom,” Justin grumbled, and Lance laughed because he was still happily buzzed and it was a new year, and he had five more months of doing whatever he wanted to look forward to. And first on that list, he thought with a grin, was Justin.

He was intensely hung over the next morning, because he hadn’t been drinking like that in a long while. Justin gave him some Bloody Mary mix on the plane, swearing it helped, and let him take the window to sleep. He sat next to Lance with his headphones on, singing “I am the entertainer, been all around the world, played all kinds of palaces and laid all kinds of girls.” Lance laughed as he fell asleep and dreamed on Justin up on stage singing only to him.

5.

Justin had rented a place near Nashville, fully furnished. Still, there was the matter of personal touches, so he dragged Lance to a fancy linens store to pick out sheets and towels that measured up to his standards.

“What do you think of these?” Justin asked, holding up a set of navy blue on navy blue stripes. Lance shrugged.

“They’re fine.” He wandered ahead down the aisle of sheets, eyes roaming the shelves. “Don’t they have anything white in here?”

“White sheets are boring,” Justin whined, taking a set of the navy sheets and a separate package of pillowcases. “And the bedroom’s already that beigey non-color. It needs something brighter.”

“Those aren’t brighter,” Lance said. “If you want bright get these.” He pulled a set of yellow and red flowered sheets from the shelf and tossed them at Justin. Justin bobbled the package, dropping it and the blue ones. He scowled as he picked them up, stuffing the flowery ones back on the shelf. Lance smirked.

“Ok, let’s not get something that looks like my Aunt Linda would have in her bedroom.” Justin handed the blue ones to Lance. “Hold these while I try to get those ones down,” he ordered, jumping up high to snag a package of summery green cotton sheets from a high shelf. Even Lance had to admit that they were nice.

“Those are cool,” he conceded, setting the blue ones down. Justin picked them up again.

“We’ll get both,” he said.

“If you want two, get the green and those other blue ones there.” Lance pointed to a lighter set on the endcap.

“Nope. You get to pick one, I get to pick one.” Justin smirked, and ducked out of the way when Lance tried to pull the package out of his hands, laughing. He held them up over his head, making Lance jump.

“You know, that wasn’t funny five years ago, it’s not funny now,” Lance said. Justin just laughed, switching hands. Lance lifted his foot as if to stomp on Justin’s instep and they froze there like a paused movie.

“You wouldn’t dare,” Justin said.

“Try me.” Lance watched Justin weigh the options, then duck and run out of the aisle, dashing away out of sight.

It only took Lance a moment to take chase, finally catching up to Justin in the candle aisle where he’d stopped to smell something pretty.

“No candles,” Lance warned, taking the glass jar from Justin’s hand and forcing it back on the shelf. “Remember the shower curtain?”

Justin winced. “Good call.”

“Do we need anything else?” Lance asked, looking around.

“Nope. Just gotta get home and try out the sheets.” Justin wiggled his eyebrows, making Lance laugh.

“Your mind’s in the gutter,” he said, steering Justin back into the store. “And we needed towels too, remember?”

Justin made little discontent moany sounds and purposely resisted moving as Lance pushed him back into the store to finish shopping.

Back at Justin’s new house, Lance set up camp in the office, planning out his spring. He’s sold Bacon and Eggs two years earlier, after the last movie had done rather well and Miramax decided they’d rather just buy him out than sponsor his productions. He’d sold it gladly, letting Wendy go with the company and work her way up the production ladder. Since then, he’d had his hands in a few smaller projects but mostly just done nothing. He was itching to do something again.

Justin worked strange hours, usually going into the studio after lunch and staying until late in the night. They weren’t together very much, but it was a weird kind of domesticity that Lance appreciated. He even offered to split the bills, but Justin just laughed and kissed Lance on the forehead. It was a bit patronizing, but Lance wasn’t stupid enough to throw money at someone who had about four times what he did.

Lance liked to listen to blues around the house, or old bluegrass country, so he’d programmed Justin’s digital house system to play it on a constant loop in hopes of being inspired. Sometimes it worked and he got a lot accomplished in the afternoons while Justin was at the studio. Sometimes it didn’t, and he found himself flipping through the television to find Judge Judy or The People’s Court, because he had a secret love of those bad court shows.

Mornings with Justin, though, were his favorite part of the day. Sometimes they’d run errands, wandering through the grocery store, debating whether or not it was worth sacrificing the taste of orange juice for the lower calorie orange beverage they sold next to the juice on the shelf, or what kind of ice cream they should get, until eventually both mint chocolate chip and mocha chip ended up in the cart. Usually, though, they’d spend time in the kitchen, another bright sunny room with a breakfast nook and a big oak table. Lance had his notebook computer out there, and he’d read the paper online, commenting on the headlines while Justin ate his cereal. Then they’d talk about everything that had happened since they’d seen each other the day before, be it progress on Justin’s record or Lance’s contacts yesterday.

“I found us some office space,” Lance told Justin. He’d spent the past week online browsing through advertisements until he’d finally found one that would suit the company. Joey had run over to check it out yesterday and made an offer.

“I can’t believe you ‘n Joe are actually doing this,” Justin said around a mouthful of Honey Nut Cheerios. “You’re gonna do my first video, right?”

“Of course,” Lance said, pleased that Justin would ask. He smiled, thinking about when everything was going to be up and running. They were sticking to small format- music videos, commercials, maybe even TV specials. Lance wanted everything to be short term, to keep up the variety and allow for a wide base of clientele. Joey had done a couple of music videos on the Latin scene for one of his friends over the past few years, and there was a lot of buzz about him taking on more jobs.

Justin sang a little bit of one of his new songs while they worked, and Lance liked it, it was good. More R&B than usual, but still really good. Justin kept humming while he loaded the dishwasher and Lance finished getting his news for the day.

When it was done, Lance turned to Justin and said “Want to go for a drive?”

Justin scratched his head. “What for?”

Lance rolled his eyes. “Because the cleaning service is coming today and I always feel weird being around while they’re vacuuming. Because it’s a fucking gorgeous day outside and because you have a really fun car.”

Justin laughed. “You’re not driving my Ferrari.”

“Fine, fine.” Lance smiled, because Justin wasn’t even dressed yet, still wearing pajama pants and a UNC shirt that had to be five years old, at least. “But do you want to?”

“Sure.” Justin got dressed while Lance wandered around picking up random things that he didn’t want the maid to find.

It was too cold to have the top down, but the drive along the river was still beautiful, sun catching on the water. “So, what are we doing here, anyway?” Lance asked when they were on the bridge.

Justin glanced at him. “Um, driving?”

“No, I mean. You and me and this whole 50s sitcom domestic existence.” Lance turned down the Sublime CD that blared from the stereo. It made him think of Florida in the old days.

Justin shrugged. “We’re living in the moment. Isn’t that what you’re supposed to be doing?”

“Not really.” Lance tapped his fingers on his knee. “Taking what I want, that’s what I said. But seriously, this is getting. Like, we’re living together.”

“We’re staying together.” Justin frowned. “It’s not the same thing, and you can go if you want to.”

“No. I don’t.” Lance sighed, because this wasn’t going the way he’d planned at all. “Forget it. It’s good.”

“It is, man. We should have done this a long time ago.” Justin smiled at him and revved the engine on a straight away. “Hey, there’s that place up there where they have those Italian Ice things.”

Lance looked at the dashboard clock. “It’s not even 11,” he said.

“So? Don’t you want one?” Justin asked, and those were the magic words. Lance laughed and turned up the stereo again.

**

Lance flew up to New York for a few days to talk business with Joey. They were starting small, but already Lance was hearing that there was buzz. Chris’s band had lined them up to do a video, and JC and Tony had a collaboration for a soundtrack that looked like it might be a single. Plus, Lance noted in his email, Lindsay Lohan was asking around. She’d taken Britney’s place as hot girl singer when Britney pulled a Madonna, getting married and reemerging a year later with an album about love and the meaning of life.

“There’s a soundstage in Jersey City that looks good,” Joey was saying. “I went and checked it out. It’s close enough to the city to be convenient without the heavy price tag, and it’s good size. There’re a couple of different specs there, too, in case you want to look at them.”

Lance nodded. “Yeah, thanks.”

“So, there’s that one, and one near Battery Park. There’s another one near Greenwich, but that’s the most expensive, so I think one of the others. We can go check them out this afternoon.”

Lance glanced through the specs and hummed. Joey kept talking, but Lance’s mind wandered away. Justin’s birthday was in a few days and he still hadn’t gotten him anything. What did you get for your pseudo-boyfriend, ex-bandmate, super-good friend? He doubted Hallmark had cards for Gay Lover of the Moment.

Joey whistled a “hu-hu” and Lance blinked.

“Are you even listening to me?” Joey asked, thumbing the pages of a book on the table to make weird farting noises.

“No, I’m here. I’m just. OK, do you have any idea what I could get Justin for his birthday?”

“What did you get me?” Joey asked bluntly. Lance almost answered, before catching himself.

“I’m not gonna tell you. Nice try though.”

“No, really. Like, whatever you got me, it has to be better than that. Cause you’re sleeping with him.”

“I could sleep with you and get him the same thing.”

Joey screwed up his face in mock disgust. “No, then you’d have to get me something huge to apologize for scarring me for life.”

Lance laughed. It had become somewhat of a running joke between them. “No, seriously. What should I get him?”

“Something he wants but would never buy himself,” Joey advised. “That’s what Kel always tells me.”

“This is Justin,” Lance said wryly. “He buys everything that isn’t nailed down, and he comes back with a crowbar for the stuff that is.”

“Then get him a new crowbar?” Joey suggested. He glanced at his watch. “Hey, we gotta go if we’re gonna see the studio space and get back by two. You ready?”

Questions unanswered, Lance grabbed his coat and scarf.

**

Lance had planned to stay in New York for a week, and he talked to Justin on the phone almost every night. Still, he was unprepared to be woken up by Justin banging on his hotel room door before ten in the morning three days into his mini-vacation.

“Hi,” Justin said, suitcase leaning against his thigh. He was wearing a thick oatmeal colored turtleneck sweater and looked like a warm fire on a cold winter day. “Did I wake you up?”

Lance rubbed at his hair, which was surely sticking up in every direction, nodding. Joey had dragged him out to a bar last night and he hadn’t gotten in until the sky was pink with dawn. “What’re’ya’doin’here?” he managed to mumble in one long word.

Justin shrugged and walked into the room. Lance let the door swing closed with a click and wandered back to the bedroom, crawling under the covers again. Justin followed, sitting at the foot of the bed, making it dip so Lance rolled toward him. Lance burrowed the covers over his shoulder.

“I missed you,” Justin said, rubbing Lance’s foot through the covers.

Lance smiled lazily, glowing inside. “Me too. Get in,” he said, lifting up the blankets.

“I slept on the plane,” Justin said, but Lance just waved the blankets around until Justin sighed and stripped down to his boxers and climbed in.

“Hi,” he said, kissing Lance’s nose. Lance curled into Justin’s warm body, so much nicer than sleeping alone. He closed his eyes, breath evening out as he fell back to sleep.

It was almost like they were married, Lance thought later on, as they shared the bathroom to shower and shave, easing around each other at the wide marble sink even though there was plenty of room to clean up without being in each other’s space. They went shopping together and critiqued clothes and a new watch for Lance, before heading to dinner with Joey and Kelly. They went back to Joey’s place after for coffee, so Joey could send the babysitter home.

“Are you gonna be around at the end of the week?” Joey asked.

Lance rolled his eyes. “No, I’m leaving before your birthday, dumbass.”

Joey made a face. “Well, I didn’t know if you guys were like, planning to go someplace or something.”

“We don’t plan,” Justin said, toeing off his sneakers and tucking his feet under him on the couch. “We’re living in the moment.”

“Must be nice,” Kelly said. “To be able to do that, no responsibilities.” The baby monitor on the table was a constant reminder that Joey’s life was very different than Lance’s. Lance knew that, but sometimes he forgot. Sometimes he forgot that they weren’t all young and on top of the world.

“It’s cool,” was all he said, sipping at his hazelnut flavored coffee from the fancy chrome pot in Joey’s kitchen that always cooked coffee to the perfect temperature. Justin slid down until he was leaning more against Lance than the couch.

Like a marriage, Lance thought, but one without a future.

**

They stayed in New York until after Joey’s birthday, which they celebrated at Suede with about 300 of Joey’s closest friends. It was almost like the old days, Lance thought, with a drink in one hand and a microphone in the other. He toasted Joey elaborately, because it wasn’t every day that your best friend turned 30. It was a somber reminder that Lance would be next, a thought he drowned in a glass of something dark and vaguely nutty flavored but packed with the pleasant burn of alcohol.

He didn’t lose Justin this time, clinging to his side for most of the night, dancing together like at Joey’s wedding a couple of years earlier, the last time they’d fallen into bed together. The difference now was that they were both actually single and leaving together at the end of the night. Lance liked that infinitely better.

Joey was easy to buy for, because he liked everything. Lance had gotten him a few fun gag gifts, like Viagra-shaped breath mints and a bottle of anti-aging tonic that was really hardcore moonshine from some place in West Virginia. He also got him a hammock, because Joey needed to relax, and some old records that he’d picked up to add to Joey’s latest project, his jukebox.

Justin had watched him wrap all of them earlier in the day, dutifully laying a finger down on the ribbon so Lance could tie a tight bow.

“What’d you get me?” he asked, looking at the pile of loot for Joey. Lance shrugged noncommittally. “Come on, tell me. You know that I don’t get off on surprises.”

“What if I haven’t gotten you anything yet?” Lance ventured, hoping that Justin wouldn’t be mad.

He wasn’t. He laughed. “Dude, you suck. You’ve only got two days!”

“You’re a really hard person to buy for, you know? You have everything, and you don’t exactly have the patience not to instantly buy something you want.” Lance cut the edges of the ribbon and ran it over the blade of the scissors to make it curl. Stacey had taught him to do that when they used to wrap presents for their parents on Christmas Eve years ago.

Justin was still laughing. “Whatever you get me, I’ll love it. I promise.”

Lance doubted that. He’d dropped the subject and in the flurry of activity to get ready for the party, Justin hadn’t brought it up again. Now, Lance had two days and absolutely no idea. He took another sip of his drink and let it wash the worry away. Justin’s hands brushed across his lower back as they danced, making Lance grin and focus his attention back to the boy at hand.

Two days later, Lance was standing in the airport looking at the signs for far away places when he thought of the perfect present.

4.

Venice was cold, as cold as the States, but there was something so magical about it that Lance didn’t even think to complain. He tucked up the soft fuzzy collar of his fur-lined leather jacket and leaned into Justin as they waited for the water transit to pick them up.

“Dude, I can’t believe we’re really here,” Justin said for about the millionth time that day. Lance smiled again, even though he’d heard it before. The impromptu vacation had been the perfect gift, since Justin was finishing up with his Nashville studio time and not due in LA for another couple of weeks.

“You said you’d never seen it.”

“I haven’t, which is why it’s so cool.” Justin dangled his foot off of the edge of the dock experimentally. “Do you think the water’s cold?”

“Um, yes. I do. And not very clean, either.” It was a beautiful green, but Lance couldn’t see more than an inch below the surface. “If you’re going in, I’m not going to save you.”

Justin sighed. “You just want my solos,” he teased, an old joke.

“That made a lot more sense when we were actually recording,” Lance replied, tucking one hand into his pocket. With the other, he reached for Justin’s hand and drew him back from the edge.

“Someday,” Justin promised, and Lance didn’t reply. It was a touchy subject between them, between him and all of them. Lance wanted to get back into *NSync, the others had stuff to do first. He didn’t resent them for it, but they didn’t discuss it because it led to arguments.

“Hey, so, what are we supposed to be seeing today?” Lance asked, because Justin loved tourbooks. He’d read three of them on the plane, dog-earing the pages of places he wanted to visit.

“Well, there’s tons of stuff in St. Marc’s Square. I think we should go to the church first, cause that’s supposed to be amazing. They’ve got all these gold mosaics that are from, like, the 12th century.” Justin licked his lips and squeezed Lance’s hand. “Is that cool with you?”

“Yup. This is your birthday trip, we can do whatever you want.” One of the joys of jotting off to a foreign country with no advance reservations meant that the paparazzi hadn’t found them yet. They’d never been huge in Italy, and now, didn’t even register as a blip on the radar. Lance leaned closer to Justin as the taxi boat arrived. “Can we get a gelato too?”

Justin smiled, ducking his head adorably. “It’s freezing out here and you want ice cream.”

“Yup.” Lance stepped onto the boat and let Justin negotiate directions and price with the driver.

“After the Basilica,” Justin promised, standing close to Lance as they picked up speed into the wind.

**

Lance had never pegged Justin for a museum guy, but he walked the corridors of the Doge’s palace with quiet reverence. Lance read the signs next to the relics and works of art, tagging along as Justin’s lips quietly moved over the curator’s messages.

“I didn’t know you were so into this stuff,” Lance said casually, letting a hand linger on Justin’s back as he leaned over a display of ancient choir books. The notes were so different from what they used, but he could still figure out the beats. He was amazed at how universal music could be.

Justin tilted his head and smiled at Lance, up close. He stole a kiss before stepping away. Alarmed, Lance glanced around, but saw there were alone. He followed Justin into the next room, full of remnants of tapestries.

“It’s cool, you know. This stuff that’s been here so long. Like, this was the great work of the ages. I wonder if something I do will be in a museum in 500 years. Like, will people look at music to one of my songs behind glass?”

“I think computers have kind of eliminated that. I mean, there’s thousands of copies of our music. Not just one or two.”

Justin stopped walked and looked at Lance with disgust. “Way to ruin the moment.”

“Sorry.” Lance really did feel bad. He hated to ruin Justin’s museum moment, particularly since he was so bored. “Would gelato make you feel better?”

Justin laughed, turning toward the exit. “Man, you have gelato on the brain.”

“I can’t help it, it’s the sugar,” Lance whined, chasing after Justin until he could drape over his shoulders. “Come on, you know you love mixing the flavors.”

Justin grinned. “Lime and tiramisu, dude, just to make you vomit.”

Lance just groaned.

They had lunch in a tiny trattoria, sharing a pizza margherita and a bottle of wine. Wine had never sat well with Lance, who could down shots like water. He was shaky on his feet when they left the restaurant, leaning heavily on Justin’s shoulder.

“Let’s just walk around,” he suggested, hoping to clear his head. Justin agreed, and for an hour or more they wandered the narrow streets of Venice, pausing to read menus in restaurant windows or to study the displays of local merchants. Justin bought Lance a bottle of water from a market and they sat in a piazza while he drank it.

“Feeling better?” he asked, one hand on Lance’s back rubbing soothingly. Lance closed his eyes as the world slowly steadied.

“Yeah. Sorry. Remind me not to drink wine after skipping breakfast, okay?” Finishing the water, Lance screwed the pink cap back onto the bottle and looked around for a trash can. “This place is eerily deserted,” he commented. There wasn’t another person in sight.

“Yeah, well. Everyone’s working or something.” Justin smiled and twisted around to kiss Lance. “I like being able to do that.”

“Mmmm. Me too.” Lance kissed Justin again. “Come on, I know you want to do more stuff today.”

Justin smiled. “Dude, yeah, but the tourist stuff’ll all be there tomorrow. I say we call the day a wash and go back to the room.”

Lance grinned. “I have no problem with that at all.” Sex was great, and he was truly having a good time with Justin. He’d thought the trip would just be something nice for Justin, but it was turning into a genuine vacation for him too.

But, sex, he thought, trying to remember the way to the Grand Canal so they could hire a taxi back to the hotel.

In front of him, Justin paused. “Which way?”

Groaning, Lance looked around. Damn their collective lousy sense of direction. Everything off of the canals in Venice looked the same, stone buildings and streets crossing stone buildings and streets. “Let’s do it here, there’s no one around.”

“Dude, have you seen those movies about Italian prisons?” Justin screwed up his face and began to walk.

“Yes, I saw Ocean’s 12, the prison looked fine. I think you’re thinking of Mexican prisons, and no, I wasn’t serious.”

“Whatever. Just, you know, we’re wasting daylight.” Justin crossed a bridge over a small canal onto an even narrower street that led into another piazza. “I don’t suppose you have a map?”

“Actually, I do.” Shaking his head, Lance pulled one out of his back pocket and they studied it carefully. After much longer than it should have taken in any sort of educated reality, they finally navigated back to the hotel.

Justin closed the door with a click and toed off his shoes. Lance watched as Justin’s mouth eased into a smile. “C’mere,” Justin said, reaching for Lance by the beltloops and pulling him close. Lance shuffled his feet a bit on the hard tiled floors until they were hip-to-hip. He tipped his face up for a kiss, letting Justin linger with closed lips, soft breath on his cheek.

This was different. This was tender and sweet, and it warmed Lance to the core, Justin’s hands on his shoulders, big fingers pressing lightly into his skin. He slid his lips apart in invitation, tasting as Justin’s tongue brushed against his own. He could feel his heartbeat against his wrists, right where his skin touched the denim of Justin’s jeans.

Tilting his head to the right, Lance slipped his mouth away from Justin’s to kiss wetly against his neck. Justin made high breathy sounds of happiness, letting his head fall away, bared the thick chords of muscle beneath his skin. Lance sucked on them less-than-gently, his tongue rubbing on the rough stubble that had grown since morning.

“God,” Justin breathed, snapping his head up again and recapturing Lance’s mouth with his own. “Fucking God.” He got his hands up under Justin’s sweater and undershirt, reveling in the warm damp skin hidden beneath. He flattened his palm on Justin’s flat stomach and felt the muscles clench and quiver under his fingers. He rubbed at the trail of fuzzy hair leading down from Justin’s navel to the band of his underwear with the side of his thumb. Justin shivered, mouth coming off of Lance’s to breathe.

“Why’s your shirt tucked in?” he asked, and Lance realized that Justin had been fumbling to get him undressed. Lance smiled.

“I was cold.” He nipped at Justin’s chin with a quick kiss, then leaned back to yank on his button-down shirttails out of his pants. His sweater flew over his head, and Justin didn’t even bother with the buttons, just grabbed the tails of Lance’s shirt and pulled up. Lance threw his arms up in the air and let the shirt fly off into the corner. Chest bare, he watched as Justin pulled off his own shirt by the neckline.

“Still cold?” Justin asked, humor in his voice. Lance shook his head, no, but Justin ran his hands up and down Lance’s arms anyway, briskly at first but slowing to more of a caress. “Good. Wouldn’t want you to get sick.”

”Sick and hung over. Some vacation that would be.” Lance took two steps back to sit on the bed and pull off his shoes. He slid backward, not letting his socked feet hit the cold floor. Justin untied his sneakers and lined them up under the bed before crawling up and flopping down next to Lance.

“I think we need to invest in some Italian condoms,” he said, pulling a few Trojans from his travel bag that sat on the nightstand.

“What, like, souvenirs?” Lance laughed, pulling Justin onto him, the heavy comforting weight. Justin’s legs spread like roots, anchoring Lance into the mattress. “That’s fucked up.”

“You’re fucked up,” Justin retorted, lame but he was laughing, and kissing Lance again, so it didn’t matter. He ground his pelvis into Lance’s, and the sensation nearly drove Lance wild. He was achingly hard, pants terribly tight. He reached for the zipper, tugging at it quickly, popping the button on the top of his pants and Justin watched with a hungry smile.

When Lance’s cock broke free, red and fiery, Justin bent his head and sucked at the tip, holding it lightly in the fist of one hand while the other pushed at Lance’s underwear until they bunched down below his hips. Lance loved this part, and Justin didn’t do it often because he said it messed with his throat when he was singing. He closed his eyes and focused all the sensation on Justin’s wet mouth closing over his dick.

“You’re so hot,” Justin murmured, smiling as he kissed the side of Lance’s cock. Lance thought about protesting, but couldn’t get more than a groan to escape his lips. His teeth were clenched in a brutal battle not to come. He laid a hand on Justin’s shoulder, holding him at bay for a moment.

“You OK?” Justin asked, and Lance nodded wordlessly. Justin slid up, brushing a kiss on Lance’s temple. “How do you want to do it?”

“Just this,” Lance said, reaching back around Justin and pulling his ass close. Justin thrust a little bit, his cock hard and pressing through his jeans. Wordlessly, eyes never leaving Lance’s, he arose to strip, quickly clamoring back down onto the bed, pushing Lance’s jeans off his feet. Nude, they lay together, kissing with open slick mouths, hands everywhere.

When Justin reached up and wove his fingers through Lance’s hand, Lance nearly keened with want and something that he couldn’t quite grasp. Something that made him squeeze Justin’s hand as waves of pleasure rolled through his body, shattering his control with an orgasm as intense as any he’d ever felt before.

It was beautiful, Lance realized, the true kind of beauty that didn’t exist in a Hollywood smile or a bouquet of flowers. It was the kind of beauty that rocked you from inside until everything glowed. It was love.

On their last day there, Justin stopped by a gondola dock and looked back at Lance with a smile. “Wanna?” he asked.

The driver charged them an arm and a leg, and the water of the canal smelled a little bit funky, but the ride was nice. Justin wrapped his foot around Lance’s ankle in a hug that wasn’t a hug and pointed out the iron balconies and pointed window decorations as they sailed down the narrow canals. Wedged in the seat between them, Lance wiggled his hand into Justin’s. He thought of the night before and smiled.

3.

After they got back from Venice, things were different. Not bad different, or even uncomfortable, but quieter. They didn’t go out as much anymore, and often spent time together not even talking. There were things to talk about, but Lance didn’t want to say them. He was afraid once they were said that everything would change. He knew that it would.

Beth called one afternoon when Lance was sitting around doing absolutely nothing. It would have been nice, except he was getting pretty sick of doing absolutely nothing. March had rolled in with beautiful weather, an unseasonably warm spell for western Tennessee that allowed Lance to settle in a lawn chair with a couple of magazines that he didn’t really want to read and a glass of water that collected condensation in fat beads on its sides and left a ring on the deck table. Coldplay drifted out through the open kitchen window, Justin’s choice of music from the morning that Lance had been too lazy to change.

“You need come back and visit,” she complained. “Mike’s getting married in a couple of weeks, you should come down.” Mike was a guy from high school that Lance vaguely remembered. Since moving back to Clinton, Beth had fallen in with the old crowd again.

“I dunno, I feel like I’m moving backward every time I’m back there.” He couldn’t really explain it, but going back home always made him feel like he’d missed something, like everyone else in the world was clued into some big secret that he’d never learned. They were all marrying, having kids, talking about mortgages. Joey was married, and Lance had two mortgages, but somehow it was different because it wasn’t home.

Beth snorted at his justification. “Like you’re getting so far where you are now.”

Lance sighed and held the glass to his forehead, drops of water falling into his eyes. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“You’re living with someone you’re not committed to and you’re surviving off of your savings.” Beth had never really understood the concept of finding yourself. She’d know what she’d wanted to do with her life since she was ten.

“I’m working on a new company. The thing with Joey, we’ve already got the space all lined up. It’s good.” Absently, Lance smoothed the wrinkles on the sides of his pants. The rough ridges of denim ripped under his fingers. He wished that he wasn’t stagnating so completely in every other area of his life.

“That’s good. I’m really glad, cause you guys have talked about that for, like, ever.”

“Yeah.” Lance fell silent for a second before asking, “Do you think I could bring Justin to the wedding?”

He could sense that Beth was frowning. “I thought that you guys weren’t serious.”

“We’re not, but. I dunno, we’re together, even if it’s just temporary. And I mean, I brought Jesse to Liz’s wedding last year and no one really said anything.”

“Would Justin come as your date to something?” Beth asked skeptically, and Lance knew she was right. Justin was the world’s most perfect boyfriend, as long as they didn’t have any public appearances. Justin just wasn’t ready to come out, or even to come out without actually coming out the way Lance had. He wasn’t even sure why he’d asked.

“Probably not,” he said. He listened to her beg a little bit longer and promised to think seriously about a trip home before hanging up.

He was still sitting there, asleep, when Justin came back a few hours later, bouncing on studio energy.

“Hey,” Justin said, sitting on the end of the lawn chair. Lance came awake slowly, blinking into the blinding late-afternoon sun.

“Hey. What time’s it?”

“About four. I got that song done, you wanna hear it?” Justin smiled at him, hair lit from behind like a halo.

“Sure,” Lance agreed, stretching as he stood, letting Justin lead him into this house and away from the conversation that he knew they should be having. He didn’t want to deal with that anytime soon.

**

Lance decided to go to the wedding. He wasn’t getting much accomplished since the studio project was out of the planning stages and into the hands of the implementation team, overseen by Joey in New York. It just seemed like the thing to do.

He had an early flight, so he dressed in the dark and didn’t wake Justin until just before leaving. Sitting on the edge of the bed, Lance rubbed at Justin’s shoulder gently until he stirred.

“You leaving?” Justin mumbled, eyes blinking open, lips hardly moving with the words.

“Yeah. I’ll be back in a few days.” Lance leaned down to give him a quick kiss that lingered far longer than he’d meant. Justin’s morning breath was terrible, but not a deterrent. Suddenly, Lance wanted to climb back under the covers, those dark blue sheets he’d fought so hard against, and curl up next to Justin.

“Call me when you land,” Justin said when Lance finally pulled away, eyes already closing as he fell back to sleep. Lance grabbed his suitcase, pausing only once to look back before closing the door.

When he got to Mississippi it was raining, the short flight bumpy through the heavy, dark clouds. Lance settled back into the limo and rolled his cell phone around in his hand. When he finally got up the courage to dial, Justin didn’t answer.

**

Lance’s dad was in the garage with the door open when Lance arrived, the hood of the car up. His hands were greasy and there was a smudge of dirt and oil on his cheek too. He looked just like Lance’s dad from when he was ten years old.

”Hey,” he called out, dragging out the word as he jogged down the driveway to greet Lance with a haphazard hug, not touching him with dirty hands. “You’re here!”

“Yup. What’s wrong with the car?” Lance asked, setting his bags inside the garage, out of the rain on the dusty concrete floor.

“Nothing’s wrong, just checking the oil.” He wiped his hands on a rag and let the hood fall shut with a ‘bang’. “How was your flight?”

“Short, but bumpy.” Lance rubbed his stomach, still a bit nauseous. He needed to try calling Justin again.

“Your mom’s got tea all ready if you want some,” Lance dad said. “I’ll be along in just a minute, soon as I clean up out here.” Lance’s mom would never tolerate a mess, even in the garage. It made Lance smile, and he went inside to the warm glow of the kitchen lights, a plate of lemon squares on the table and a kettle steaming on the counter. Home, he thought, and opened his arms as his mother rushed in.

He sat at the table while she served the tea, leaning over his shoulder to pour hot water into a cup. “You smell different, honey,” she commented, walking to her seat. The kettle rested on a homemade coaster that sent off whiffs of cinnamon as it warmed. “Did you get new cologne in Italy?”

Lance lifted his hand to sniff, and realized that it was Justin’s botanical soap. He’d swiped an extra bottle from under the sink as he packed that morning. “Just soap,” he answered.

“How’s the company going?” his mom asked, and they talked for a long while about the production process. Chris and his bandmates were supposed to be meeting with a set designer next week to begin preproduction for their first video. Lance was both incredibly excited and uninterested at the same time. It didn’t seem real yet.

“It will,” his mother reassured, passing him another lemon square. He took it, happily, the powdered sugar from the top sticking to his lips. “It’ll be good for you to have some work to do again,” she continued. “The Lord didn’t want us to be lazy.”

Lance nodded, ignoring the subtle dig about his current lifestyle and living situation. He licked the powdered sugar and drops of lemon crème from his fingers. When the tea was gone, his mother brushed off offers to help clean up, insisting that he settle in and shower before the rehearsal dinner that night.

After he changed, Lance was coming back down the stairs and overheard his mother saying “He just doesn’t seem happy, is all I’m saying.”

His father’s voice answered, “Give him time. I’m sure it’s just a funk he’s in.”

Lance slunk out the front door, calling goodbye just before it shut. He borrowed his mom’s car, and parked it around the corner, cell phone tight in his fist for a long time before taking a deep breath and driving away.

Getting what he wanted wasn’t supposed to feel so awful.

**

At the party, Lance drank too much, danced too much, and smiled for too many pictures. Mike’s girlfriend had a lot of teenaged cousins who wanted to know everything there was about Justin, and talking about him all night long was just about enough to push Lance over the edge.

Someone drove him home, he wasn’t sure who, but someone who swore they only lived right around the corner from Lance’s parents and could walk from there. Lance sat in the passenger seat of his mother’s Lexus, with its creamy leather interior, and called JC, because JC would always listen to him bitch and moan when life got him down.

JC answered on the first ring, music rapidly fading away in the background as he turned down the volume. “Where are you, man?” he asked.

“At home. In Mississippi. My parents’ house.” Sometimes, Lance wasn’t sure that qualified as home anymore. Other times, he couldn’t think of any place else that did. “I’ve got a huge problem.”

“What’s wrong?” JC asked, and Lance could nearly picture him leaning forward earnestly to listen. Lance leaned back in an imaginary countermeasure, dejectedly rested his head on the back of the seat.

“I think I’m in love with Justin,” he said. “I’m pretty sure of it.”

“Oh.” JC was quiet for a long minute. “And that’s a problem?”

“Yes. Because it’s just supposed to be this casual thing, you know, like, we’re both unattached and why not? He’s never said anything different. Never even really hinted at it. And now I’m all ‘Hey, I’m in love with you’ and it’s just going to screw everything up.” Outside, the rain fell a little bit harder, a rapid fire drumming on the car roof.

“How do you know that, until you tell him?” JC asked carefully, encouragingly.

“Because everything’s so good right now, and I don’t want to fuck with that. It’s only for another couple of months, anyway, until he’s on tour and I’ll be up in New York. I’m drunk. I shouldn’t be telling you all this.” Miserably, Lance closed his eyes. His hand was heavy from holding up the phone.

“No, no, I’m glad you did. But man, you’re telling the wrong guy, you know? You need to just, like, take a chance, because you’re only gonna feel shitty if you don’t.”

Lance said goodbye and dropped the phone into his pocket as he made his way inside through the dark rain.

At the wedding, things were better, and Lance, though hungover in the morning, was in good spirits in the afternoon. He sat at a table at the reception with friends from high school, both single and married, and generally had an enjoyable evening. The meal was delicious, the hall not too gaudily decorated, and the sentiment of the night perfect.

He was on his way home when Justin called, the rain abating to a gentle mist clinging to his windshield and wipers.

“Hey,” he said warmly, holding the phone in his right hand and steering with his left. “Where have you been?”

“Wrapped up in post-production. When there’s nothing to come home to, it’s kinda pointless to leave the studio. I swear, this is the first fresh air I’ve had all weekend.”

Lance chuckled lowly, heat spreading out from his heart to warm his fingers and toes. “I’ve missed you too.”

“Yeah? Well, hey, what time’s your flight coming in tomorrow? I’ll meet you at the airport.” There was the clicking of a pen on the other end of the line, and Lance relayed the information to Justin from memory.

“Cool. Oh, and hey, Lance?”

“Yeah?” Lance asked, pausing at the stop sign at the end of his parents’ street.

“Nothing. See you tomorrow,” Justin said, and the phone went dead.

Lance sat at the stop sign until another car came and beeped his horn, jump starting Lance into motion once again.

2.

Lance needed to go to LA, to check up on his house there and check in with a few people about contracts for videos. The entertainment world might be willing to fly to NYC for filming, but business was done on the west coast.

Justin decided to tag along, because of promo and rehearsals for the tour, which he decided could be done anyplace. Lance didn’t have any objections to that.

He did, however, object to Justin’s insistence that he stay at his house.

“It’s stupid,” Lance insisted. “We’re gonna be together every night anyway, why not just leave your stuff at my place?”

“Why don’t you leave you stuff at my place?” Justin fought back stubbornly. They were sitting across from each other on the airplane, toe to toe, eye to eye.

“Because I have people coming out for meetings and I can’t invite them to your place. It’d be weird.” Lance knew he was in the right on this one. “Besides, we’ve been at your place for months now. Would it kill you to stay at my house?”

“Your house is further away from downtown,” Justin insisted.

“And your house is on top of a fucking mountain, so what?” Lance wasn’t in the mood for any of this, so he pulled out his headphones. “Fine, you know, whatever, we’ll go to our own houses.”

Justin opened his mouth to reply but if he actually said anything, Lance couldn’t hear it over the blast of music from his iPod.

At home, which wasn’t really home, Lance unpacked and walked down the road to the beach. With his feet in the sand and the sun on his face he felt grounded, more so than he had in a long time. He took a deep breath and looked directly into the sun until his eyes burned a little bit. Down the sand, a girl was running with her dog and a couple of older women stretched out on blankets. Peace, Lance thought. Suddenly, he wanted a sno-cone.

He went out that night, because he couldn’t sit at home alone and think about Justin and how he loved him a lot but really didn’t like him at all in that moment. He was dancing to the beat of synthesized drums and could feel the alcohol surging through his bloodstream when hands touched his shoulders, big familiar hands.

“Fancy meeting you here,” a voice whispered in his ear, and this person was pressed up against his back, hard cock poking into Lance’s sacrum. “I’ve been watching you. You’re so hot.”

This was exactly what Lance had been dancing to get out of his system, but he spun around in Justin’s arms and pressed even closer, just for a moment. Closed clubs were relatively safe, but you never could tell. Justin’s eyes were swirls of color from the sweeping lights, and when he cocked his head to one of the private rooms in the back, Lance felt his lips tug up in a smile and nodded.

It was hot in the dark room Justin pulled them to, the door locked securely behind them and nothing but a bench and some walls for decoration. Lance sweated through his t-shirt, Justin’s hands rough and fumbling underneath it.

“Fuck,” Lance breathed, “leave it on. I don’t even want to know what’s on these floors.” Justin licked a long stripe up his neck and smiled into his skin just under Lance’s ear. When he fixed his lips to suckle, Lance moaned loudly, a decrescendo of lust.

Justin’s hands were everywhere, and Lance’s were just pressed up against the wall so that he wouldn’t fall over, wouldn’t pitch forward and knock Justin down in the process. His dick was hard, achingly hand, and it twinged and twitched with anticipation as Justin tugged on the zipper to his jeans and pulled it free. Justin’s hands wrapped him tightly and held on. “Not too soon,” Justin cautioned, and Lance laughed.

“That’s never been a problem for me,” he promised, and placed his hands on Justin’s shoulders, pushing him down gently. Justin went, and Lance couldn’t even see him but he sure felt the first wet swipe of tongue on his cock, the long suck on the tip that made his toes curl deliciously. When Justin took more into his mouth and whirled his tongue about, Lance banged his head against the wall hard enough to see stars. When Justin took in more, bobbed even deeper, Lance’s hands fisted in the fabric of Justin’s shirt and held on tightly. Behind him, the wall throbbed with the deep bass of the club music.

“Not recording anymore,” he gasped, and Justin pulled off his dick to answer, “yup,” before diving right back in again. His hands were clenched on Lance’s thighs, holding him up against the wall, his knees resting on Lance’s sneakers as his mouth moved back and forth splendidly. Lance felt his stomach muscles quiver, a tinge flying up from his balls, and he tapped Justin’s chin to let him know the end was imminent. Justin only took more, so that when Lance finally came in a mind-numbing orgasm, it flowed straight from his body down Justin’s throat.

Justin rose right from his knees and kissed Lance, the salty taste overwhelming, sending Lance pushing deeper, tongue licking every bit of flavor off Justin, so good, so real. When Justin started to turn them, Lance went willingly, down on his knees, hands fumbling with Justin’s belt and damned button fly.

“Not on my face,” he warned, even though Justin hadn’t tried that in a long time.

“Promise,” Justin panted, as Lance stroked his cock in smooth movements of his palm. “Besides, that’s only good if I can see.”

Lance wanted to add more, that it was disgusting and weird, but Justin’s cock poked at his lips and he opened them, sucking on the tip like a bottle, then taking in more until Justin started making soft breathy sounds of pleasure. He pulled back and let Justin thrust a little bit, loving the way Justin’s hips just rolled through his hands, his jaw stretched so far it hurt, his nose tickled by crinkled hair with each thrust. Justin panted, hard, and came with a gasp, body tight with rigor.

When they’d dressed again, after a few more moments of making out against the wall that were nearly enough to get Lance going again, Justin reached for the door and found the latch. Music slammed into Lance as he stepped back into the hall leading to the main dance floor. His lips burned from Justin’s kisses.

“Are you coming home with me?” Justin asked, and Lance almost caved, because he wanted to. He really did. But he always wanted to sleep in a bit the next morning, rather than drive through LA traffic to make it home by the time his first meeting started. He was beginning to think the whole home-meeting thing with artists wasn’t such a great idea, but his assistant swore it made potential customers think he was serious about working with them.

“I can’t,” he said. “Wanna come to my place?”

Justin bit at his lip. “Trace is at my place; he’s only here for a few days.”

Lance didn’t ask why Justin had come out, then, or what he would have done if Lance had agreed to go home. Rather, he smiled a bit at Justin and slid out the door into the cooler night air.

**

Everything was coming unraveled, Lance realized one morning, when he woke up for the sixth day in a row away from Justin. He still slept on the left of the bed, still kept his head on one pillow, but somehow, he’d thrown out an arm onto the empty space and not realized nothing was there.

JC was coming down that day for lunch, so Lance made idle attempts to clean up the kitchen and the patio, since JC was a big fan of dining al fresco. He scrubbed at the seagull shit on the railing with a wire brush and wished he’d gone for the daily service from his cleaning crew rather than the twice-a-week option.

JC arrived in jeans and flip-flops and a big yellow smiling face on his T-shirt. His hair was short, his face clean shaven, and for a moment Lance thought it was 1996 again. Then JC started to talk about some shitty club he’d been to, and the image was shattered.

“Hey, what’s up with J?” JC asked suddenly, pulling the tomatoes from Lance’s salad and eating them. In exchange, he forked over his cucumbers.

“What do you mean?”

“He’s like, I dunno. Weird. I was over there the other day, and like, he’s all dancing and shit.”

Lance took a gulp of ice tea. “Isn’t he in tour prep?”

“Well, yeah, but he wouldn’t even talk to me. Weird.” JC eyed the plate of brownies greedily.

“Take one,” Lance gestured with his fork. “And I don’t know what’s up with him, but yeah, he’s being weird.” Very weird, since he hadn’t seen Lance more than twice in a week. So much for ‘I miss you,’ Lance thought bitterly. “I think it’s LA. It’s fucking with the thing we had.”

“LA fucks with everything,” JC agreed, swallowing a brownie in one huge bite. “I thought you loved him,” he said through a mouthful of chocolate.

Lance shrugged. “Right now, I want to punch him in the face then throw him down and fuck him. I don’t know what you call that?”

JC laughed, snorting brownie then choking, spitting chocolate bits everywhere as Lance jumped up and thumped him on the back, pulling up his arms so he could breathe. It was a good long while until he finally stopped giggling, and Lance’s salad was completely destroyed with a sprinkling of snorted brownie bits.

It was funny, except that it was his life, and it wasn’t what he wanted at all.

**

Lance finally got some alone time with Justin a few days later, because he agreed to stop by Justin’s house after spending some time shopping. He had only a little more than a month left until his “do what I want” time ran out, and there were a lot of things left. When he thought back to the list he’d made in December, Justin had supplemented a good portion of that list.

Lance resolved that would not be the case anymore. A little piece of him died when he thought about it, but he couldn’t stop life because of the unfortunate incident of falling in love with Justin Timberlake. He’d just have to live around it.

That didn’t mean, of course, that when Justin called he wouldn’t go. He wanted to.

Justin tasted different in LA, fruitier and harder, like he drank more and that bit of liquor never quite faded from his lips. Or maybe that was Lance. Either way, it was different, it was rough, and it felt amazing.

They didn’t make it past the couch, and Lance vaguely hoped that Trace wasn’t still around to walk in and find his pasty white ass sticking up in the air as he sat back on his heels and bent down to kiss at Justin’s inner thighs. He loved so many things about Justin, one of them the way his muscles tensed and tightened at the slightest stimulation.

He also loved the fact that for the first time, ever, Justin’s ass was just fleshy enough to jiggle a little bit as he walked into the kitchen naked to get them something to drink. The tropical juice he brought back in tall blue glasses hit the spot. Lance sipped its sweetness as Justin searched for his shorts.

“Try behind the plant,” Lance suggested, smiling at the surprise on Justin’s face to find them tossed so far away. He dressed quickly, and pressed a kiss to Lance’s cheek as he walked by the couch.

“Someone’s in a hurry,” Lance commented, unable to pull his eyes from Justin as he fixed his hair in the hall mirror. He’s mentioned a few days ago that he might shave it again for the tour. Lance tried to talk him out of it.

“Yeah, I promised some of the guys that I’d meet them downtown later.” Justin turned to Lance and smiled. “You’re welcome to come too, of course.”

“Oh, gee, thanks.” Lance put down the empty glass and reached for his underpants, sitting on the other corner of the couch. “So this was just a booty call?”

“What? No, I told you, come hang out with us tonight. Then we’ll come back here--“

“And what? Fuck around again? No thanks.” Tugging his shirt over his head, Lance stopped to stare at Justin. “Do you realize what’s happening here? How things have changed since we got to LA?”

“What? Just because we’re not together every second-“

“We’re not together at all.” Lance let that sink in for a minute. “We were, but we’re not anymore, and I guess I need to just get used to that.” It hurt, he realized, the words literally stealing the breath from his chest.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Justin asked, standing in the doorway, not letting Lance pass when he tried to leave. “No, fucker, you’re not getting out of here until you explain what the hell is going on.”

Lance stood resolutely two steps down from Justin in the living room and tried to find a way out of the house without spilling his heart and making a fool of himself.

The phone saved him the trouble.

1.

Later, Lance would remember how Justin’s hand had felt in his, steady and sure even when the rest of his body betrayed him. His eyes darted around worriedly, his lips moving in silent prayer. Even his shoulders had the hunch of a defeated man. Lance wrapped his free arm around them and whispered those useless words that everyone said in hospitals. “He’s going to be OK,” and “They’d tell us if something was seriously wrong.”

Joey had been there already when they arrived, pacing through the corridors, drinking cup after cup of weak coffee. JC was in Mexico for the weekend, but already on his way to the airport, last Lance had heard. Bev was stuck in Pittsburg because of a freak rainstorm, but would be on the first flight out to Florida.

He didn’t know how long they sat there, only that the sun had been up when he arrived and was up again now after long hours of darkness. They’d tried to make them leave, but no one was going anywhere. Ray sat in a chair across the tiny waiting room with his eyes closed, but Lance doubted he was sleeping. He just didn’t fit into the rest of the *NSync tableau, complete once JC came racing in, only to fall into a chair and wait like the rest of them.

When the doctor finally came out, he was smiling, and they leapt to their feet in perfect unison.

“We had to remove his spleen,” he explained, “and his left leg’s going to be in traction for a few days before we fit it into a cast.” Justin squeezed Lance’s hand tighter. “He’s lost a lot of blood, but he’s going to pull through. You can go in and see him in a bit, a couple at a time.”

Justin relaxed at that, even as the doctor warned about the scratches and bruising that covered most of Chris’s body. He slumped against Lance, a heavy weight that Lance had to brace himself to support.

“But he’ll be OK?” JC asked, just to be sure.

“He won’t be dancing for a while,” the doctor said. “Or doing much of anything. But he’s going to be fine.”

At that, the heavy spell over the waiting room was broken. Joey and Ray shook the doctor’s hand, and JC went to call Bev to let her know. Her plane still hadn’t taken off.

“Thank God,” Justin whispered, bowing his head into Lance’s. “God, he’s such a stupid shit.”

“You ride just as fast as he does,” Lance reminded Justin, rubbing his thumb beneath Justin’s eyes, where tears leaked.

“I know, but he’s still stupid.” Justin tightened his arms around Lance until they couldn’t stand face-to-face anymore, Lance’s chin hooked over Justin’s shoulder.

”I’m glad it wasn’t you,” Lance found himself whispering, and Justin nodded mutely into his shoulder, wetting Lance’s shirt with tears of relief.

**

Things were different after that. That, being the moment when Lance walked into Chris’s hospital room and saw his leg held up by ropes and pulleys. Chris smiled at them weakly and told Justin he looked like a mess.

“You scared us, man.” Justin stood by the bed, not daring to sit, but held one of Chris’s bandaged hands in his own. “You scared us good.”

Chris reached his other hand up for Lance’s, face dropping into seriousness. “I’m really seriously going to be OK,” he promised. “Can you get me a milkshake?”

Lance smiled, because this was Chris, never letting shit get bad, and Justin was smiling too now. They made small talk for a few minutes, then left so Joey and JC could go in. In the hall, Justin looked at Lance. He looked very small.

“Can we just. My house isn’t far, and I just.”

“Sleep,” Lance agreed, and called for a car. They went back to Justin’s place and went right to bed.

Lance woke up to the sound of the shower and stretched. His mouth was dry, his head aching, his body ripe with days old sweat. He tried to remember everything that had happened since the last time he’d woken up, but LA seemed like too long ago to have been any part of this reality.

He joined Justin in the shower, climbing over the low stone lip of the great glass enclosure. Justin turned and smiled under the water. He wordlessly reached out and slicked a soapy washcloth across Lance’s bare chest.

“We need to talk about stuff,” he said. Lance bowed his head. Talking meant telling, something he knew he needed to do. There wasn’t the worry of ruining things anymore. LA has done that. Lance actually wanted to get things out in the open.

“After we go see Chris?” Lance asked. Things were good that morning. He wanted one more good morning, so that when things were all over, he would have that to remember.

Justin nodded and passed him the shampoo. They didn’t fuck or even kiss, but it was the most intimate shower of Lance’s life. He brushed a bubble of soap off of Justin’s shoulder with a gentle hand and Justin smiled like Lance was his whole world. It made him feel like Atlas, struggling to keep it all from falling down.

Chris was in better spirits when they saw him the next morning. Or, as he told them, on better drugs. Bev had been by earlier, but Ray had taken her to get settled in Chris’s house and have some lunch. Chris was being spoon fed applesauce by a cheery looking brunette nurse.

“Hey,” he called, waving his friends in. “This is Amy. She wants to marry Justin, but she’ll settle for me.”

“In your dreams,” she laughed, scraping the sides of the plastic container for one last spoonful. “Do you need anything else?” she asked before leaving.

“Well, there’s that thing we talked about earlier…” Chris wiggled his eyebrows, and Nurse Amy slapped his one good arm.

“I ought to write you up for sexual harassment,” she warned. Turning to Justin and Lance, she smiled warmly. “Tell your friend he’d better clean up his act before the night shift gets here.”

“You won’t be able to resist me forever!” Chris called, but she was already out of the room. Turning to his friends, he shrugged. “What? I can’t play video games with one hand, and the TV doesn’t have cable. I’m bored!”

They pulled up chairs and hung out for a while, watching Ellen on TV and laughing Justin’s ex-girlfriend’s pathetic interview.

Justin sighed. “She was so hot.”

“She’s a bitch,” Lance answered. His defenses sprung up. Chris laughed.

“She is, but she was hot.” Justin sat up a little as the commercial came on. “Hey, man, mind if we take off for a bit?”

“Sure, sure, abandon the injured.” Chris waved them away. “Go, I’ll be fine. C’s coming by later with magazines and books about the power of mental healing.”

Outside, it was hot and muggy, so different from the dry heat of LA. Lance liked it better. He thought, he really was crazy.

“Let’s go down to the water,” Justin suggested, and together, they drove to the beach, even though it took a couple of hours. Mostly, they just sang along with the songs on the radio, the pop station that neither of them ever admitted they listened to, but knew all of the words.

“I have to tell you something,” Justin said when they got out of the car and leaned against the hood. The sun dipped down over the ocean. “I know I was being an ass in LA.”

Lance snorted. “No shit.”

“It wasn’t you,” Justin said, eyes closed as the sea spray blew off of the water. “I just felt like things were getting too close. I needed a little distance.”

“You could have told me,” Lance answered, after a long moment of silence. He tried to process what Justin was saying before blurting out the wrong answer.

“I should have,” Justin admitted. He lay one hand over Lance’s on the car hood. The metal was still hot from the engine. “I’m sorry.”

“Me too,” Lance said. “I couldn’t figure out what was going on. I thought, maybe.” He stopped.

“What?”

“Thought you didn’t want to be with me anymore.” Not what he’d wanted to say.

Justin slid closer. “No. Just. Things are ending, you know?” Justin touched his free hand to Lance’s chin and kissed him lightly. “I’m sorry.”

“Someone will see,” Lance said, drawing away.

“I don’t care.”

“You do.” Lance wouldn’t let Justin ruin his own career to prove a point. “I believe you, about being sorry. I’m sorry I pushed back.”

“We’ve still got a few more days before the tour,” Justin offered. “I kinda want to stay here, keep an eye on Chris until he’s out.”

Lance hummed acknowledgement. A loud seagull call broke through the quiet breeze.

“Will you stay with me? Just until the end?” Justin’s voice was lost in the crash of the ocean. It didn’t matter. Whatever he would have asked, Lance agreed.

0.

Justin left for tour on a Tuesday. Lance flew to New York that afternoon.

“Want to go out for dinner?” Joey asked that evening, as they finished up their first day of work.

Lance wanted to. But. “I can’t. I’ve got to call about a million people tonight.” Playtime was over.

Joey just shrugged and said goodbye. Lance thought about Justin and wondered how the show was going. Wondered if Justin was thinking of him.

1.

Three weeks later, Lance woke up to a banging at his door and the ringing of his phone all at once. Glancing at the backlit screen, he fumbled with the locks until mellow light and Justin fell into his apartment.

“What the hell?” he asked, because Justin was turning on lights and pacing around in blind fury.

“Shut up, just. Let me talk because I’ve got about five hours and then I have to get back on a plane and fly back to Boise or wherever the fuck I’m supposed to be sleeping right now.”

“Why aren’t you there sleeping?” Lance asked, scratching his head. His heart was jumping to a million storybook endings and his brain was telling his heart to shut the fuck up already.

“JC told me that you said you were in love with me.” Justin stopped pacing and looked at Lance dead in the eye. Fuck. “Is it true?”

“Justin.”

“Is. It. True.”

There was no answer but the truth. “Yes.”

“Since when?” Justin stepped closer, and dropped some of the malice from his voice.

“Since Venice.” Lance sank to the couch, legs unable to hold him up any longer. He’d thought he’d started to get over this thing, but apparently, he’d been wrong. Way wrong. The wounds on his heart began to bleed all over again.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Justin sat down on the coffee table, and he was so close that Lance had to look at his hands so that Justin wouldn’t see how raw and open he was.

There was no real answer, but Lance fumbled around one, saying things like “you said casual,” and “didn’t want to fuck things up.” He couldn’t see Justin’s reaction, until Justin touched his chin, lifting his face. One long finger was laid across his lips.

“Stop.” Justin said. “Just stop. Listen.” Lance nodded. “I love you. I’ve loved you, I think, since you went to that wedding and I couldn’t figure out what to do without you. And every time I tried to give you some sort of hint you just, like. I dunno, it was weird.”

Lance nodded again, still not speaking because Justin’s finger was still on his mouth.

“And then I got freaked, cause I didn’t want to be all pining away forever, so I decided that we should, like, wean off of each other. Hence LA.”

Suddenly, it was like a light turned on and Lance could see in all of the dark corners. Everything just clicked. Relief washed over him, and hope. And he felt like a major tool for not saying anything, because if he had- things would have been so different.

“So,” Justin said, “I just wanted to clear that up.” He got up, as if to leave, and Lance jumped up behind him. His mind was racing- what? No! No fucking way was Justin walking out the door now. He’d said five hours, it’d been ten minutes.

“Where are you going?” He blurted out, and Justin turned on a heel and smiled.

“Just to the kitchen. I want some ice cream.” He kept walking, and Lance followed, wincing at the bright overhead fluorescent lights that he hadn’t had time to replace yet.

“I don’t have any,” Lance said as Justin buried his head in the freezer.

“Damn. See, I’m trying your thing.” Justin closed the freezer door and walked up to Lance, touching him for the first time, hands on Lance’s shoulders.

“My thing?” Lance wanted more, wanted to lean closer, but he held back, waiting to see where Justin went.

“Your doing what you want thing.” Slowly he lowered his head. “I want to kiss you,” he said, when their lips were only millimeters apart. When they touched, Lance’s whole body filled with love.

For long minutes, all Lance heard was the tick of the living room clock and the soft wet sounds of kissing. Justin sighed and pulled back, his lips shiny and slick. “Only I’m not limiting myself to six months,” he added. “So you’re going to have to be with me for a really long time.”

“What if what I want is something different?” Lance asked, just to test. Justin raised an eyebrow.

“Is that really going to be an issue?”

Lance smiled slowly and kissed him again. “No,” he answered, “no, no, no.” He glanced at the clock- four hours and twenty seven minutes left.

Or, he thought, since he was sick of countdowns, a lifetime.

END


End file.
